November 5th

 

broken necked clothmen

paraded, stuffed with paper

tonight they will die

murder bonfires made

pushed in prams, propped on trollies

penny for the Guy

As a kid I thought it kind of sinister that other kids made effigies of a man who was to be executed through fire. Dragging him through the streets asking for money, his disturbing strawman bloated body, stuffed with paper and old cloth, filling out a pair of grubby old discarded trousers and threadbare jumper. He didn’t have hands and feet, just stumps tied with string, to stop his innards from spilling outwards. His head was a sackcloth bag, with a crude face painted on. It was fairly hideous. And he was normally smiling, you wouldn’t expect a condemned man to be smiling. This was a man we were going to plant on top of a bonfire and burn to death. Smiling would be last thing he’d be doing. We pushed this abomination along on an old trolley or in a pram. “Penny for the guy” kids used to shout. “Here’s a shilling, now fuck off and get that evil looking thing away from me!”. I never made one myself, but sometimes I used to tag along with some of the other kids in north London, I never kept the money for myself as it wasn’t my Guy, I was just grateful to be part of this disturbing ritual.

Now that this tradition has all but disappeared, I kind of miss it, it’s an interesting part of social history. Barbaric if thought of in isolation, but in historical context, fascinating. I want to burn effigies of people on a bonfire

As for fireworks, I’ve never been fussed about them. I read too much into them. The nihilism of their pointless lives extinguished so soon! Also I associate fireworks with feeling sad. When you’re a kid, you want what other kids have and so I wanted fireworks too, but I never asked for them. Our family were hard working, working all hours. Fireworks (like bicycles – I’ve never learnt to ride or ever owned a bike) would have been considered a frivolity, an unnecessary expense. I don’t begrudge my parents this, I knew they worked hard, saved and scrimped, so I never demanded anything of them which might be considered a luxury, but that didn’t stop me feeling sad. So on November the 5th I used to sit in the dark and look out of the first floor back window and try to catch glimpses of other people’s displays. If there was nothing in the terraced back gardens, I’d look to the skyline and try to catch the explosions of distant rockets bursting, note the colours, the greens, reds, blues, brilliant whites, the mortars pop pop popping into the air and exploding. For those really far away displays I’d hold my breath in expectation, the silent burst of light, then a moment later hear the boom or crackle. I’d be excited by the magic of science, the speed of light and the speed of sound, the sync ever so slightly out. And then I’d go to bed. The next day some of the kids at school would marvel at the displays they’d been to, but a lot of kids were like me, they watched the fireworks from their windows too.